Along familiar streets like Nguyen Ai Quoc, Pham Van Thuan, Huynh Van Nghe, Tran Cong An, and especially the park along Nguyen Van Tri Street where I often stroll alone every afternoon, crape myrtle trees bloom in profusion. This flower isn't as boisterous as the flamboyant red flame tree, not as proud as the velvet rose, and certainly not as flamboyant as the hydrangea. The crape myrtle possesses a gentle, serene quality, like a young woman who knows how to hide her feelings deep within her eyes; only those with true sensitivity can discern it.
I've always loved the color purple. Purple symbolizes fidelity and dreams. So every time the crape myrtle season arrives, my heart fills with joy. Sometimes, even just a small cluster of flowers peeking out from behind an old wall is enough to make me stop for a long time, take a picture, and cherish it as if I've just held a piece of my youthful sky in my hands.
This afternoon, I wandered the streets alone again. Ancient crape myrtle trees spread their branches, casting shade over a long stretch of road. A breeze from the Dong Nai River blew, fluttering the white ao dai dresses of a group of schoolgirls leaving school. It was as if I saw myself from years ago, also in a white dress, also pressing crape myrtle petals into my notebook, hastily writing someone's name on those poignant May afternoons.
The familiar café on the corner of Vo Thi Sau Street was sparsely populated today. I ordered an iced coffee with condensed milk and sat by the window overlooking the trees. The purple blossoms of the crape myrtle reflected in my eyes, making my heart slow down. I opened my old notebook; the carefully pressed crape myrtle petals from my twelfth grade year were still intact. The petals had dried and turned a pale purple, but the words at the bottom were still clear: "Sending back my seventeenth year to the month of crape myrtle blossoms."
That name is no longer with me, but the memories of those early flower seasons remain as vivid as if it were just yesterday. I remember those scorching midday suns, my friends and I cycling home from school, passing by a road covered in purple fallen flowers. Some burst out laughing when a flower hit their head, others gathered the fallen petals into their bike baskets, saying they'd save them for love letters. Those school days were filled with nothing but first crushes and a sky full of purple flowers.
I once heard people say that the crape myrtle is the flower of unfulfilled love. Perhaps it's because it blooms so profusely and then fades so quickly, breathtakingly beautiful yet fleeting. But perhaps that's also why people cherish and preserve the crape myrtle. Like me, every time the flowers bloom, I yearn to find a touch of the past in its gentle purple hue.
The other day, I was wandering along Nguyen Ai Quoc Street and stopped at an old bookstore. Inside, the owner was meticulously wiping dust off books that had faded with time. We chatted for a while, and he told me that before 1975, this place used to be a famous bookstore, where young men and women in Bien Hoa would meet to buy notebooks and find poetry. One student, who would give his girlfriend a notebook every year during the blooming season of the crape myrtle flowers with a romantic dedication, still occasionally visits to look for old books and relive those memories. I suddenly realized that Bien Hoa was once so romantic, not just about factories, workshops, and hurried crowds…
Walking across the Ghenh Bridge and looking down at the winding river, I saw a row of crape myrtle trees on the other side, their blossoms a vibrant purple. Beneath the trees, a couple was taking wedding photos. The bride smiled radiantly, gently stroking a flower petal as if caressing a tender memory. Bien Hoa is in love, alive, and becoming a place where every crape myrtle blossom season is beautiful and evokes such fond memories.
Someone once told me, "If you were a flower, you'd surely be a lilac, silently captivating, gentle yet unforgettable." I don't know if it was a compliment or a farewell, but since then, every lilac season, I wander, searching for my reflection in that purple sky – the place where I once loved, dreamed, and wrote my diary entries with tiny petals falling onto my school uniform.
These early days of May, Bien Hoa feels so different. Not because the city is changing every day, but because it's donned a dreamy purple cloak unlike any other city. Every tree, every sidewalk, every small alley... holds a footprint of memories for me. And the crape myrtle, like an old friend, always returns at the very moment I need silence, when I need to reminisce.
If you ever thought Bien Hoa was just a place to visit and then leave, please try coming back during the crape myrtle flowering season. Standing beneath the silently falling purple blossoms, you'll feel your heart calm down, time seem to stand still, and who knows, memories of your school days might come flooding back.
Even if the streets of Bien Hoa change color in the future, even if the roads once stained purple with the memories of youth are transformed; even if I travel further, crossing more magnificent or glamorous cities, Bien Hoa will always remain in my heart the azure sky of the crape myrtle season of that year. It will still be Nguyen Van Tri Park with its trees casting shadows on the path where I once strolled silently, and the small street corner by the old café where someone's eyes gazed for so long without daring to speak.
For me, Bien Hoa is as beautiful as my first love. Gentle yet poignant. Not boisterous, but deeply etched in my memory. The seasons of crape myrtle blossoms will pass, time will sweep everything away, but that purple hue – the purple of first love, of a dreamy youth – will remain forever, intact in my heart.
Essay by Ngo Huong
Source: https://baodongnai.com.vn/dong-nai-cuoi-tuan/202505/mua-hoa-bang-lang-nhung-ngay-tim-mong-mo-38e2f1c/
![[Photo] General Secretary To Lam presides over a meeting with the Editorial Teams to summarize 100 years of the Party's leadership of the Vietnamese revolution and 40 years of implementing the National Construction Program.](https://vphoto.vietnam.vn/thumb/1200x675/vietnam/resource/IMAGE/2026/03/04/1772601288977_a1-bnd-8134-7576-jpg.webp)
Comment (0)